Scott

In this dark and gritty collection - featuring short stories from Jim Butcher, Seanan McGuire, Kevin J. Anderson, and Rob Thurman - nothing is as simple as black and white, light and dark, good and evil.... Unfortunately, that's exactly what makes it so easy to cross the line.

Our universe is ruled by physics, and faster-than-light travel is not possible - until the discovery of The Flow, an extradimensional field we can access at certain points in space-time that transports us to other worlds, around other stars. Humanity flows away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our home world and creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It's a hedge against interstellar war - and a system of control for the rulers of the empire.

Hunted and on the run inside the fabled and dangerous City of Thieves, U.S. Army Ranger Sniper Sergeant Thor must pull the greatest fade of his career as powerful sorcerers and conniving eunuchs dispatch small armies of deadly mercenaries and vicious hired killers to track down and take what Thor has stolen fair and square. Other dangers await the Ranger inside the wild and untamed alleys, temples, once-mighty fortresses, and degenerate palaces of the Ruin's greatest and most ancient of cities.

Johnnie Rico never really intended to join up—and definitely not the infantry. But now that he’s in the thick of it, trying to get through combat training harder than anything he could have imagined, he knows everyone in his unit is one bad move away from buying the farm in the interstellar war the Terran Federation is waging against the Arachnids. Because everyone in the Mobile Infantry fights. And if the training doesn’t kill you, the Bugs are more than ready to finish the job.

Inheriting your uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might think. Particularly when you discover who's running the place. Charlie's life is going nowhere fast. A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all he wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan. Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie. But becoming a supervillain isn't all giant laser death rays and lava pits.

Chloe Mendoza and her team from Monster Hunter International must seek out and destroy an ancient evil threatening Los Angeles at the height of Disco Fever.

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television "family."

Telos is a world at the center of a Universe. A bright jewel wrapped in a Lattice of realities. It is a world that gods and demons call home at the beginning of a new age. Remy is a newly risen deity, struggling to survive in a Battle Royale where the consequences are worse than death and last longer than damnation. He will find that he cannot live with his tribe of worshippers. Their strength is his, and his is theirs. Other tribes want nothing more than to feast upon their flesh and consume their power.

The battle of the dead was won, but at a great cost. Sion, leader of the Mist Village, was left with only pain and regret as Richter was claimed by the abyss. What no one but the abandoned chaos seed knows is that he narrowly avoided the curse of the lich Singh, a curse that still hangs above his head. Now, surrounded by miles of darkness and tons of crushing rock, Richter has to find his way back into the light.

Gabriel Espinoza is dead, yet living in a world where he never sees those he loves and cares about. Every day of his existence is one of fear; however, this fear keeps his edge sharpened and his senses honed while he continues to fight for his Emperor. Fear can be a useful tool in the proper hands. Andrew Espinoza is both dead and alive, caught in a juxtaposition of identities that not even he can truly understand. He embraced his fear long before, and it has made him a loyal servant to the Dominion of Man. It also is his driving force, as he knows it is a double-edged sword.